Antibodies
This way of fighting tumours is relatively new. First of all, an explanation of what an antibody actually is: It is a protein that plays a major role in the immune defence. An antibody specifically recognizes a foreign structure, an antigen, binds it and thus leads to its destruction.
The special thing about an antibody is that it only recognizes certain “sick” structures, normally not the healthy cells. Therefore, in our case it mainly works on tumour cells. Some target structures are mentioned below: Although this list of cytostatic drugs is in most cases the basis of every chemotherapy, the research for new substances never stands still. Thus, in many clinical studies, new substances are already being tested which may achieve much better results in the future! – Bevacizumab: binds to the vascular growth factor VEGF
- Cetuximab :binds to the growth factor receptor EGFR
- Rituximab: binds to the surface protein CD 20
